"Some knowledge enters gently. Some knowledge rips its way in."
The morning air tasted metallic, as if the city itself had bitten into something cold and unpleasant. Jel walked toward school slowly, shoulders hunched, collar tight around his neck to hide the trembling he couldn't fully suppress. The street was loud enough—cars passing, vendors shouting—but somehow the world still felt quiet.
Too quiet.
The kind of quiet that felt aware of him.
He tried to tell himself he was overreacting.That yesterday had been a one-time event.A hallucination.Stress.A imagination in his mind.
But he wasn't a stranger to the subject.He wasn't ignorant.He wasn't the type to shrug fear off as imagination.
Fearlogy wasn't just some elective he had taken because he needed credits.It was his best subject.His obsession.His comfort.His weapon.
He understood fear better than anyone in his year.
Yet none of that knowledge saved him.
His mind drifted back—uninvited—to the beginning of it all.
The first case hadn't come from a hospital, a doctor, a research lab, or some ancient spiritual tradition.
It came from a man on a train.
The story was infamous—so infamous that every Fearlogy teacher brought it up at least once a year.
A commuter, early 2000s, standing near the doors.Train packed.Evening rush.People tired, irritable, half-asleep.
The man suddenly froze.Not a small hesitation.A complete, absolute stop.
Eyes wide.Hand still in the air, reaching for the overhead strap.Breath shallow enough to miss.
The train kept moving.People cursed, pushed past him, assumed he fainted.
But when the doors opened at the next station, something strange happened:
He woke.Walked straight through the crowd.Stepped onto the tracks.And let the next train hit him without blinking.
He didn't even flinch.
Fearlogy was born the moment someone asked:
"Why didn't he react?"
Humans don't ignore trains.Human instinct is built on survival.But that man had walked towards death as if it were familiar.
As if fear had stopped speaking to him.
As if fear had left him.
Jel exhaled sharply and tightened his grip on his bag.
Jel remembered reading the old article at thirteen—back when freeze-state videos went viral. People made memes out of footage of adults freezing mid-walk, mid-sentence, mid-sip of coffee. They called it "brain lag," joked about "the spirit leaving the body,"
Back then, he had been curious.Fascinated.He searched everything he could find.
He learned what most people didn't:
Freeze-state victims always described the same thing:
A world gone silent.A world hollowed out.A world identical to the real one…but drained of people and warmth.
A copy.A shell.A stage set for only two actors:the host,and the thing their mind created.
The fear.
His stomach tightened.
Yesterday, the stage had been his school corridor.
He continued walking, the smell of damp asphalt filling the air. His hands sank into his hoodie pockets, fingers curling unconsciously as memories of last night clawed back.
He'd tried studying after coming home.He'd tried reading his Fearlogy notes—some desperate part of him hoping the subject he loved might comfort him.
But the words tasted different now:
"Fear prevents recklessness.""Fear sustains survival."
He used to admire these sentences.
Now they felt like lies.
Or maybe truths he didn't fully understand.
His feet slowed.
He remembered the lesson no student ever forgot:
"A fear only manifests visibly when the mind is struggling to hold it inside."
Teachers showed drawings of faint shadows, blurry silhouettes—simple shapes weak minds projected under stress.
Children saw small, harmless forms.Teenagers saw clearer ones.Adults saw detailed ones.
But yesterday…
He hadn't seen a faint outline.Or a vague blur.
He saw detail.
Disturbing detail.
Black liquid swirling like corrupted ink.Skulls drifting inside the creature like drowned thoughts.Shoulders shaped like smoke.A body that didn't look imagined…but sculpted.
A fear that took the time to evolve.
A fear that understood its own appearance.
Famous Doctor always said:
"The more complex the fear, the more intelligent it becomes."
He never believed that.
Jel couldn't ignore it now.
He passed the park on the way to school, glancing at the playground still damp from last night's rain. children climbed the metal bars, screaming in joy, falling without caring about the ground. Their parents watched from benches—tired, bored, checking phones.
He envied that simplicity.
Children had fears too, but theirs were clumsy—shadows with too many legs, floating eyes, big animals with crooked teeth. Simple shapes. Easily chased away.
But his fear…
His fear had spoken.
Its voice was smooth.Confident.Patient.
Voices don't just appear.
Voices evolve.
He remembered the therapist's warning precisely, because he had written it down in the margin with red pen:
"Once a fear gains a voice, it has gained a will."
Not a personality.A will.
And once it has will…
It does not disappear.
It does not sleep.It does not retreat.It does not go dormant.
It becomes curious.
And curiosity is how fear wins.
His legs felt heavier the closer he got to school.
He saw the building at a distance—gray walls, cracked pavement, banners hanging on the gate promoting some annual event. Students were already flooding in, forming little groups, laughing, complaining, living as if the world wasn't crumbling at its edges.
He stopped walking.
He hadn't realized how much he was shaking until now.
The wind picked up, brushing cold fingers along his neck.
And then—in the back of his own mind—a single, quiet whisper flickered alive:
"…Thinking about me?"
He inhaled sharply.
No hallucination.No imagination.No dream.
It was clear.Near.Calm.
Not threatening.Just present.
As if his fear was walking beside him.
As if it were enjoying the silence with him.
His throat tightened.He resisted the urge to answer.
Because the most terrifying rule in Fearlogy wasn't written in textbooks.It wasn't taught in classrooms.
It was something every researcher knew but never published:
"Once you begin talking to your fear… it talks back more often."
He took a slow, unsteady breath.
And walked into school anyway.
" I overthink an a lot " said Jel to comfort himself
As Jel entered the school
few mates saw him as usual they went to him and the usual bullying began, it was now normal for Jel, he was experiencing bullying for years
but this time, he was desperate to survive at any cost
he fought back
giving a heavy punch to the leader of bullies in the face, he had started a fight
Jel evaded everything until he was overwhelmed, in end bullies won Jel was bleeding seniors had stopped the fight.
Jel went to get first-aid, he encountered the bully there too.
Trail was an extrovert, who didn't like Jel as he was an introvert
After seeing today's Jel, he changed his thoughts about him
" Hey, Jel want to become friends," said Trail with a heavy breath
Jel didn't knew how to say no and he accepted the offer
The day was short it was the summer vacation beginning after all,
Just some speeches till noon with nothing to do Jel headed towards home
seeing the news, he was horrified, people were dying quicker from fear suicides
too quick.